Bush Bishop by Howell Witt
Bush Bishop by Howell Witt
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Bush Bishop
by Howell Witt
Rigby, 1979, [First Edition], ISBN 0727009877, black and white photographic plates, hardcover, dustjacket
Very Good Condition, a little edge and shelf wear, a little rubbing and bumping to edges and corners, no inscriptions, dustjacket shows a little edge and shelf wear with a little rubbing, bumping, creasing and chipping to edges and corners (see photographs)
“A laugh on every page is hardly what one expects in a book written by a clergyman – and by a bishop at that. But that is exactly what the Right Reverend Howell Witt, Bishop of North-West Australia, give in this account of his days as priest and bishop in Australia.
Howell Witt’s diocese covers one quarter of Australia; to serve it he spends seven months of the year travelling away from home – his air fares alone would pay for flights to Europe and back, twice. As bishop he has dipped sheep, scoured drinking troughs, baited craypots, flown a plane ‘by willpower alone’, diagnosed fractured skulls, played rugby, been ‘Mister Fixit’ – and remained first and foremost as a man of God dedicated to his people.
Before being sent as Bush Bishop to Geraldton, with its Bishop’s Palace that had once been a boarding house and whose cistern dropped on to the breakfast table, Howell Witt served in newly established Elizabeth, in South Australia, where he ‘had the time of my life’. The church hall functioned as kindergarten, dancing academy, old folks’ home, theatre, bargain mart and welfare agency – and at times rocked to the sound of Elvis Presley, which earned the disapproval of the local constabulary.
‘Bishops’, says Howell Witt, ‘have to learn their trade as they go along’. To travel with this man is to find a laugh (albeit a hollow one) in every cyclone and a joke in every engine failure; and it is to find time to consider the role of the church in a changing world.”
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